The cost of a long life

I'm curious what they're counting in the "The Cost of a Long Life". I assume there are medical costs, but what else is included? 

For those of us in pretty good health to begin with, could I include the cost of my bike, race wheels, Quarq, Garmin, Zoot shoes, etc?

Japan also is much much smaller.  Imagine how many fewer fire stations there needs to be.  Imagine the amount of infrastructure upkeep must be spent to maintain highways.

Edit:

Oh yeah, come to Canada.  You'll live 2 years longer!

The big question is:

Do we spend so much more because we're unhealthy and need to spend more, or just plain wasteful?

Brian

All of the above.   We are unhealthy and most people don't take personal responsibility for their health.  They want a pill or a quick fix.  Also we spends millions of dolloars in teh last 1-2 yers of life.  Also no one wants to make tough decisions for fear of getting sued.  We over order tests for fear of missing something extremely rare for fear of getting sued and people just come in assuming they need 'X"  (In my case its usually an MRI someone is demanding)  The public is directly advetised to by pharmacuetical companies which I think is a travesty and come in demanding 'Y' Drug they saw on TV.  It adds up. 

I truly believe that advertising prescription medications to the public should be illegal.  Decisions on drugs to be prescribed should be made by doctors on a patient-by-patient basis, and to market to the lay public just seems wrong.  To expect a consumer to ask for a drug (i.e. Enbrel or Humira) based on an ad or a celebrity endorsement is just wrong.

Doesn't surprise me one bit.  The cost of care for my grandmother in the last 20 months of her life was over $200K - and that is just people looking after her - no aggressive medical interventions, just meds and keeping her from wandering into the middle of the street or calling 911 to ask what day it was.

And no matter how much you spend, everyone dies eventually.